The last Sidney Nolan painting of bushranger Ned Kelly in private hands has sold for $5.4 million - smashing the previous auction record for an Australian artwork.
First Class Marksman, which shows the outlaw in his iconic homemade armour and pointing a rifle, was known as the "missing Nolan" because it is the only one in a series of 27 not in the National Gallery of Australia.
The NGA recently announced a brand new, specially designed gallery for the Nolan Ned Kelly collection - its most popular Australian attraction.
The 1946 work was bought by an anonymous telephone bidder.
"We are thrilled to have achieved this new Australian art auction record," said Rod Menzies, of Sydney auction house Menzies Art Brands.
"The sale demonstrates a growing confidence in the Australian market."
Auction record shattered
The sale eclipses the previous record of $3.48 million paid for Brett Whiteley's The Olgas for Ernest Giles in 2007.
The First Class Marksman sale also sets a new record for Nolan, whose previous highest price at auction was $1.32 million for Death of Constable Scanlon in 2000.
Nolan's 1955 piece Ned Kelly - Outlaw sold ahead of auction in 2007 for $1.43m.
Nolan is best known for his paintings of Irish-Australian Kelly, a folk hero immortalised in films, literature and paintings for his defiance of colonial authorities.
First Class Marksman was the only one in Nolan's early series of Ned Kelly which the artist kept for himself.
It was sold on Thursday by the Vizard Foundation, which had acquired it in 1992 for a reported $400,000.
"It's a very significant painting. It captures the myth of the anti-hero and the local mythology of Ned Kelly," Menzies Art Brands spokeswoman Marie Geissler said.
"It's a global great, it pulls on the heart strings of every Australian here and overseas."
